Posts tagged Salon du Sens

One of the sure-fire to connect with the other party in a conversation is always to allow the person to share what one wants to share. You’d be amazed by how easily people are willing to share once you open up the space for them to share.

We all can’t stand the guy who yaks non-stop about his life without caring about the other party, but would love to be able to be that guy. By giving the person the space we might be able to create a very enjoyable conversation for the other party.

The 3 Layers

Fitting how this was our first topic for Art of Conversation. It’s all about having a genuine interest in what the person has to share. It comes from 3 main aspects of speaking to the person:

Verbal – Questions that are open tend to allow the person to share what is on his/her mind. “Tell me about your day.” Or “What do you think about… *insert topic here*?” are some simple questions to start the conversation going.

Tone – The way we speak affects a lot. Inviting people to speak usually requires us to be soft spoken than aggressive or harsh. A mellow tone helps to create a great space.

Body language – There are general positions that people can have when open up. All you need to observe how people behave and how that affects how much you share, that gives you a great benchmark.

Overall, everyone loves a good listening, a pleasant smile and a genuine interest in the ourselves. The Open Invitation to Share is about being that person we all would love to speak to, so that the conversation can go a bit deeper than just the small talk.

In this session of the Art of Conversation, we shared about and practiced finding agreement in disagreement.

Nemo is the common point, which everyone likes and is happy.

You cannot find Nemo by staying at the same place. You need to travel through different areas to seek Nemo out. Generally, there are 3 areas for you to seek Nemo. One is in the area of preferences and opinions. It is easy to find each other agreeable and similar if you both have the same preferences and opinions. You two may in fact be twins. Read More »

In this session of the Art of Conversation, we shared about and practiced depersonalizing a sensitive topic.

Many a times we step on inevitable landmines of sensitive topics. It is hard to foresee exactly when that happens especially if we do not know the other person’s buttons well. Pressing the wrong buttons could be destructive for relationships that we value and to remedy such damages could be a tough, and sometimes impossible endeavor. Read More »